Fallout - The Star Chronicals
by Machinesmith
Summary: Max has been prodded and poked by enclave scientists, looked over by a rather attractive brotherhood scribe named Jess. But all she wants to do is get back to her family that was vault 25. what will max do? Start a new faction Fall in love Or just end up dead.
1. Chapter 1 - Enclave Facility Epsilon

I do not claim intellectual property over fallout and by extension its characters, story or likeness. The rights for any characters/ideas in this story not already owned by Bethesda softworks LCC are herby placed in public domain

* * *

Max awoke to the thunder of guns above her. Their wasn't an enclave scientist in site.

 _Thank god. Maybe they have decided to leave me alone for now_

She pulled herself of the padded metal cot attached to the wall. Her vision became a blurry haze and she let out a sigh as tried to steady herself on the bench next to the cot to prevent herself from falling to the floor.

 _I can't even see the guards outside the window._

The small explosion shook the bunker, knocking max to the ground.

"Ugh… what the hell is going on up their?"

Max hoisted herself up using the bench to support her again.

 _Now is my chance to escape._

Max slowly made her way to the terminal inside the door. She always thought it odd that the room had a terminal on the inside, bust she figured it was just that this room wasn't intended as a holding cell.

 _Its Just like the terminals at home in the vault._

Her eyes surveyed the room until they located a surgical scalpel. She slowly made her way the small metal surgical table and retrieved the scalpel from it and made her way back to the terminal.

She jammed the scalpel into the back peripheral port on the wall-mounted terminal and text began to flood the screen.

ROBCO INDUSTRIES UNIFIED OPERATING SYSTEM

COPYRIGHT 2275-2277 ROBCO INDUSTRIES

Server - 19

Peripheral port malfunction detected.

Entering local administrator account.

From their she entered terminal code to activate peripheral port 0x00F7008, more commonly known as the door and the door hissed and slid up into the roof.

 _The old peripheral port glitch. Would of thought they would of fixed that being so technologically advanced._

Now with the door open Max had access to the whole facility.

 _Now if I'm going to go to the surface I'd better find my jumpsuit. Going up their practically naked would be a bad idea._

She began to wander through the enclave facility searching for her jumpsuit. The first storeroom she encountered contained some medical supplies and a canvas bag. She stuffed the all the medical supplies into the bag and set off again.

Once again she came to another storage room. This room still didn't contain the vault jumpsuit she was looking for, but she was hardly going to pass up the energy weapons that the room did contain. She quickly scanned the room. It contained crates and creates of micro-fusion cells plasma grenades and a rack odd looking plasma rifles. They looked similar to the heirloom her dad had in the vault but it had a short curved ammunition clip where the micro-fusion port would normally be located.

 _I see it's an semi-automatic version of the plasma rifle._

She picked up a rifle and unclipped the ammunition clip to pack it with micro-fusion cells. Once completed she packed at least 50 micro-fusion cells into the canvas bag, along with some of the plasma grenades. From their she pressed on looking for her vault jumpsuit. She stopped when she came to some stairs.

 _Maybe its upstairs._

However the thought was interrupted by a large explosion. The doors atop the stairs flew down the stairs and knocked max out cold.

It was the last thing the brotherhood paladin expected when she found a half naked girl with a plasma rifle in the lower levels of an enclave facility. The paladin made its way to the unconscious girl. She appeared to be still breathing. The paladin noticed that the girl had a tag on her wrist. It said test subject 19.

 _How odd. I guess she must be one of the enclave medical experiments._

The paladin made a an attempt to awaken the stranger, however the girl remained unconscious.

"we've got a live one down here, it's unconscious and I think it may be a medical experiment. Get a squad down here and take it topside. It may know something."

Max awoke on a cot in some sort of store room. Her vision was a blur.

 _Where am I? Last thing I remember was an explosion…_

She hoisted herself of the cot and fell straight to the floor, making a small whimper of pain.

 _My ankle!_

Max slowly crawled to a locker on the other side of the room in hope it contained something she could make a splint from. It was locked. Max reached into her hair, removed a bobby pin and began to pick the lock.

 _Good old dad. He knew about energy weapons, how to pick locks and hack terminals. And he taught me all of it._

The doors of the locker sprang open. No splint. But their was something else. Something much better. Even better than her vault jumpsuit. Their lye a set of black shiny hellfire armour, complete with helmet.

 _Holy shit. What's that doing here._

 _Ok come on max; its just like the Vault-Tec power armour that dad showed me._

Max unbundled the power armour and carefully lowered her left leg into the lower section of the armour and swiftly slipped her right leg in. She then lifted the upper section of the armour and pulled over her body, wriggling her arms into place. The magnetic seal activated with a clunk.

 _I'll keep the helmet of for now._

 _Now remember let the pneumonics do the work._

Max with the added strength of the suits pneumonics managed to stand up. She walked back across the room and sat down on the cot with a loud clunk and crossed her legs.

"what was that?" said one of the knights guarding the room.

"she's probably woke up idiot. Go take her down to scribe Jessica . She'll want to check vitals and stuff." the other knight replied.

The door hissed open and the knight saw something even more unlikely than a half naked girl with plasma rifle. The same girl fully kited out in hellfire power armour.

"what the hell! What are yo-" exclaimed the brotherhood knight.

"well you didn't expect me to strut around half naked, did you?" interjected.

"but where on earth did it come from? Wait no. how do you even know how to use it? The terminal entries said you were abducted from a vault" said the knight completely thrown off by the situation.

The other knight entered the room looking even more confused than the first somehow.

"I'll answer your last question first. My dad was the head security officer for our vault so he taught me how to use the Vault-Tec power armour. Skill seems to be transferable between different models."

"But where did you get it? This was suppose to be a medical supply room."

"It was in the locker over there. Dunno why. Maybe one of the enclave hid it here."

"Take it off."

"Actually keep it on! You don't have anything under that" the knight instructed somewhat bashfully.

" Follow me, scribe Jessica has to check your vitals and stuff"

Max complied with the knight, keeping her cloths on and followed the knight down to the medical clinic where scribe Jessica was taking inventory of the newly acquired enclave facility's medical supplies.

The scribe sported orange robes and was almost completely shaven head, other than a small pony tale. She was quite cheery; though the thought foremost in Maxes mind was that she was very cute.

"Well I didn't expect her to have enclave hellfire power armour. I don't even have armour that good" scribe Jessica said inquisitively.

"As I told him earlier I don't think it's exactly appropriate for me to wander around half naked" max reiterated while pointing at the brotherhood knight.

"Now I gather by the amount of tech you guys have, you must be the infamous brotherhood of steel that I have read so much about on the vault network." continued

"Skilled, resourceful and well informed. I must say vault dweller I'm impressed" said scribe Jessica.

"Well if its all the same to you we're going to see if theirs anything else that we should be doing right now"

said the knights as they awkwardly shuffled out the room.

"Mind stripping of that armour, see if I can figure out what those enclave 'ave done to ya".

"Um... I guess" said max almost as bashfully as the knight earlier. Max began to nervously remove the hellfire armour, being extra careful when removing her left leg.

"you know you don't have to be so nervous, I don't bite. Well not normally anyway."

The scribe carefully inspected her and noticed some abrasions and swelling on her left ankle"

"You've sprained your ankle. Nothing to worry about . I'll fix up a splint and get a stimpack. It should heal 3 days maximum".

Scribe Jessica then prepared a splint for max's leg, acquired a sterilized needle for the blood test and a stimpack to help speed up the healing process.

"Now before I apply the stimpack I'm going to take a blood sample, is that ok" explained the scribe.

"Um... Ok, just make it quick please" said max a little less nervously than before.

Max bite her lip as the scribe took the blood sample and applied the stimpack's hypodermic needle. The scribe then took the sample and put it on a Perspex slide to observe under the microscope later.

"Here take this. I'm pretty sure it was your vault jumpsuit. It'd be a little less unnerving for the others if you weren't dressed as one of the enclaves finest. Anyway I didn't catch your name." said scribe Jessica.

"Name's Maxis, Maxis Star."


	2. Chapter 2 - Well how 'bout that

Three days had passed since max's first encounter with the brotherhood scribe Jessica; spending the time putting her remarkably extensive knowledge of old-world security systems to use unsealing the rest of the facility with a band of brotherhood scribes tasked with making the facility fully functional. Her technical knowledge outshone that of even that scribe in charge of the project, much to his frustration.

"I've got the blood results back max, and its unbelievable. Whatever the enclave did to you it was some next level stuff" exclaimed scribe Jessica.

"why what'd you find?" replied Max.

"It's unlike anything I've ever seen. For a start all of your cells have an attached hydrocarbon Nano-shield comprised of dense carbon lattices and ionized hydrogen. Theoretically it should provide protection from radiation akin to that of super-mutants. But that's just the tip of the ice burg. Their appears to be at least a hundred different types of what I can only call antibodies that strip toxic materials in the air straight from the bloodstream. I've isolated at least one that seems to provide immunity to the FEV. This could bring unprecedented protection against super-mutants for the brotherhood." explained scribe Jessica excitedly.

"Well if you'd like I have a fair idea where the enclave kept the research on me" replied Max.

"Really! That would be great. If I had the enclaves research I might be able to reproduce the antibody myself. Or maybe I could recreate the hydrocarbon Nano-shield for radiation protection." continued scribe Jessica.

Max lead scribe Jessica to the lower levels where the main servers for the facility were located.

"All of the facilities research should be accessible here. I'm pretty sure this is the facilities primary research server so you should be able to find all sorts of stuff down here" Max explained pointing at a big box with filled with flashing lights.

"Wow this is amazing. There is stuff I'd never imagined. Just to start with there are schematics and research notes on almost all of the different types of power armor that the enclave use. Designs for experimental energy weapons, and some of the most complex cybernetics I've ever seen. There is also the biological research on their experiments on you. All of this could put us miles ahead technologically.

Now we need to link up this server to the primary terminal network so I can access it from the medical clinic."

Responded scribe Jessica excitedly.

"It should be simple enough. Just link it to server 19 as a storage petition" explained Max as she quickly and effortlessly punched in some terminal code to the wall mounted terminal which linked the research server to the main server.

 _I have to tell the elder about this. This is amazing. It makes the battle to take this place almost seem worth it._

"If your finished linking up everything; I would like you to come with me to see the elder. He would definitely like to here about the all the research that we discovered down here" inquired scribe Jessica.

Max and scribe Jessica chatted about the possibilities that all the new enclave research could bring on the way to the elders office.

"So what is it that I can do for you scribe Jessica" said one the paladins guarding the elders office.

"I am here to see the elder about the matter of enclave research that has been discovered" replied scribe Jessica.

"You do realize as head scribe now you have to see the elder now anyway so you don't have to tell me exactly why your seeing him" the paladin responded.

"Right. Right. Still getting used to being the head scribe after we headed east from capital wasteland." she explained.

Scribe Jessica and max quickly made their way into the elders office.

"So what is it you have to report scribe Jessica" said the elder inquisitively.

"Well, with the help of the vault-dweller here, we were able to access the enclaves research server" explained the scribe.

"Ah yes, the girl that was kidnaped from her vault by the enclave that I've heard so much. Some kind of security system expert. Helped unseal some of the lower sections of the facility I hear." the elder said.

"Yes Max has been invaluable in unsealing the facility and getting us access to the enclaves research, which is what I'm to tell you about."

"Go on."

"With the help of Max we were able to gain full access to all of the enclaves research in the facility. It should be available for you to see on your terminal right their. Anyway among extremely powerful experimental energy weapons and schematics for all of the enclaves power armor, their was complete documentation of a biological experiment that supersedes the pre-war development of the FEV. As far as I can see the project aimed to provide immunity to the FEV and radiation. Theirs also something I've never seen before. The ability to filter toxins directly from the blood stream. With no observable side effects."

"Do you have any evidence to support what it is that your are saying?"

"I have one piece of evidence which conclusively shows the success of this project"

"And that is?"

"Max. It seems the enclave abducted her from her vault for the sole reason of the experiment. I've tested her blood and it seems that Max's cells are fully stable and as you can see for you self there are no physical side effects. It would take a few months for me to facsimiles everything necessary to recreate the experiment."

"Well how 'bout that. I want you to observe max for the next couple of weeks for any changes before trying to recreate the experiment."

"I don't mean to say anything out of line but I need to go back to my vault. See if anyone survived the enclave attack. Those people are my family." max interjected.

"It's OK I understand. It's the same here in the brotherhood. Everybody's family. So I will make a compromise. Scribe Jessica shall accompany you to your vault to observe any changes. And since you've been such a big help to the brotherhood in the short period of time you've spent here I will allow you to keep the hellfire power armor that I hear you pulled out of thin air. Dismissed".


	3. Chapter 3 - Traveling companion

p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"With orders from the elder scribe, Jessica returned Maxes hellfire power armor long with her plasma rifle and bag of medical supplies and ammunition. She also prepared all of the necessary supplies for their journey east to Maxes vault and the duo set of. Two traveling companions. A vault-dweller and a brotherhood scribe./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';" /span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"They had been traveling east for two days now chattering about the enclave research and technology in general. The desert had been remarkably quiet for the Mojave and travel had been quick due to Maxes power armor and scribe Jessica being so energetic. But the silence gave out when a band of raiders crossed their path./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';" /span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"I would have thought Maxes hellfire armor would be enough to deter them from attacking. But no these raiders had to be stupid didn't they./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"Scribe Jessica retrieved her also modified plasma pistol from her hip and quickly applied her remarkably good marksmanship striking a raider in the shoulder, reducing him to a pile of green goo. Max too used the energy weapon skills taught to her by her farther to reduce a female raider to go. The duo crouched behind a bolder of sandstone both packing plasma./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"There were about 8 raiders not including the 2 piles of go. About 3 of them had laser rifles the rest with crude melee weapons. One wielding a rudimentary sledge hammer fashioned out of a lump of concrete on the end of a piece of rebar. Max took a shot but missed./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"Come on Max dad taught you better than that./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"The raider thought he had the advantage now being in close quarters with his chunk of rebar. However he soon realized his mistake as the pneumonic punching power of the hellfire armor crushed his ribcage sending flying back 20 feet./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"The sight of one of the raider's strongest corpse thrown 20 feet back convinced these raiders of their stupidity as they fled further into the desert. Max taking pot shots at them all the way. She managed to get another two of them./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""I doubt we are going to have trouble with them again Max."/span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""No, I don't think there that stupid. Now only another 4 days of travel and we should arrive a vault 25 according to the geographic calculator on my pip-boy."/span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""Geographic calculator? You must have cannibalized your pip-boy to make it do calculations like that"/span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""Well in all fairness it's more of a terminal than a pip-boy now" explained Max, holding up her pip-boy and pointing at the small attached keyboard./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""Well that's what I call an extensive modification" replied Jessica./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';" /span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"The duo pressed on their travel through the Mojave the desert falling silent once again. Jessica used her knowledge of plant biology to collect the edible desert fruit they passed. Occasionally they crossed the odd gecko but either it didn't bother them or it became a pile of green go. Two days had passed this way./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';" /span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""The night air in the Mojave is actually a nice temperature for a change. It must be good having the hellfire armor with all of its thermal control systems." said Jessica wistfully./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""It may be a nice climate in here but sleeping in it is uncomfortable. I think I may take it off to sleep tonight." said Max as she unsealed the armor's helmet and sat down next to Jess and the campfire./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"Jess prepared a meal comprised of Nevada agave fruit and meat from one of the geckos that didn't turn completely into a pile of green go. Apparently Jess's knowledge of plant biology extended to cooking. Didn't seem to make a lot of since to Max but she didn't argue Jess knew how to cook. Pretty well to./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""Doesn't look like anyone's been in this cave before. It's quite secluded so I don't think either of us should need to do watch duty tonight." Jess explained./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""Good we'll need the rest. We should arrive at the vault tomorrow." Max replied./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';" /span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"Unfortunately for Jess and Max who had decided to take off the hellfire armor to sleep, the weather decided their day was too easy. The temperature in the Mojave plummeted and Max curled up next to Jess. Too cold to be nervous and too tired to put the hellfire armor back on. That night was one of the few nights that even the NCR who patrolled to Mojave to the east wouldn't wish for nuclear winter. Max wasn't used to sleeping in such close quarters to anyone else. Let alone someone she had only known for two weeks, but she felt strangely comfortable curled up to scribe Jessica. A feeling of safety even greater than the hellfire armor could provide./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"emspan style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"The human mind is a stupid thing/span/em/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"As she drifted off to sleep./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';" /span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"Max woke up early the next morning feeling well rested and ready to go. She was glad that she had risen before the scribe./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"Eager to get going, she prepared meals for them from the remnants of the previous meal. Packed up the rest of the camp. Slid into the hellfire armor. And finally woke up scribe Jess./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""You know you could have woken me earlier. You strongemwere/em/strong sleeping right strongemnext/em/strong to me" the scribe said slightly annoyed./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';""Never mind. I'll pack up the bedding and the tent. Then we can get moving" Jess continued./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';" /span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"An hour had passed since they had left the cave. They would arrive at the vault soon./span/p  
p style="margin: 0cm; margin-bottom: .0001pt;"span style="font-size: 11.0pt; font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';"A bullet hurtling toward Max rickashaying of the hellfire armor. Max looked up and saw the marksman dead in the eyes./span/p  
p style="margin: 0in;" /p  
p class="MsoNormal" /p 


	4. Chapter 4 - A long story

Max looked deep into the marksman's eyes and put her weapon down.

"What are you doing!" whispered Jessica.

Then Max raided her hands in the air. She gripped her helmet and removed it slowly and put it under her arm. Then waved at the marksman.

The marksman or rather markswoman then shouted

"Everybody weapons down! It's Max. She's come back."

At least 15 people came bolting down the hill in front of Max and jess. All dressed in a combination of vault security uniforms and vault jumpsuits. They were the survivors of vault 25.

"Max! We thought you were dead. When we couldn't find you we thought the enclave must have incinerated you with their dreadful laser rifles. But here you are Max. What happened and who is this?" said the red haired girl whose name was Crystal.

"It's really a long story" Max replied.

As the group made its way back to the makeshift camp the vault-dwellers had setup as Max retold the events of previous days right up to when she first hacked the terminal to leave the room the enclave had held her in.

"Well Max that was quite the tale Max. What are you going to do now?" Crystal enquired.

"I'm not sure. I haven't really thought what a was going to do one I got here" Max replied.

"You could stay here and train us how to some of the weapons we scavenged of the dead enclave. We don't know what we are suppose do now" Crystal continued.

"I suppose I could stay and train you. I noticed you guys picked up some of the enclave's power armor, so I guess I'll start their, train all you guys to use power armor." Max said pondering the idea.

With that Max, with the help of jess, spent the rest of the day training Crystal and the others on the use of power armor. It took two and a half days for them to really understand how to use the power armor but most of them had the basics by the end of the day.

That night that was most terrible for Max when she found her dads Vault-Tech power armor helmet with a huge hole in burned into the front.

"Your dad fought hard against those enclave bastards. He is without a doubt the only reason that we survived. When the overwhelmed enclave forces were retreating to their helicopter thing after he had wiped the floor with the ones that wielded mini-guns, one with a weird looking laser cannon got him right in the head." said Crystal as she tried to comfort the sniffling heap of hellfire armor that was Maxis.

Max spent the night crying her to sleep within the confines of the hellfire armor. She refused to take the helmet or any other parts of the armor off.

They say time heals all wounds, but for Maxis it was the idea of vengeance that brought her out of the self-seclusion that occurred over the next two days.

Max ordered everyone who had power armor to get suited up. That they were heading back to the vault to scavenge the place for anything they had missed. Once they had arrived Max used the password her dad wasn't supposed to tell her to unseal the heavy security armory and anyone who hadn't already been assigned power armor was equipped with the vault-tec power armor. And the remainder of the contents of the armory was stripped out and bundled up for transport. The group then left the vault declaring that it was no longer their home but a relic of the old world.

"You found the survivors from your vault and armed them with some of the most powerful weapons in the wasteland. What now?" jess asked Max.

"I suppose after I return you back to the brotherhood we'll travel further east. Uphold justice, help the weak. You know all the cliché things that good guys do" Max replied with a slight giggle.

"I remember dad used to talk of a huge city of lights to the south. Called it Vegas or something. Might head that way. See if it's still there." Max continued.

"Vegas 'ay. Well if you ever find it. Be sure to come back and tell me. I'm sure the brotherhood would be more than interested if something like that still existed." Jess responded.

Max and her crew began the journey to the brotherhood stronghold it had made from enclave facility epsilon


	5. Chapter 5 - Atomic Diversion

AN: a review would be much appreciated.

The atomic fire ripped through the desert landscape turning what little desert life there was into cinders. The explosion was to large too be a mini-nuke but too small to be a full sized atomic warhead. The device that let this explosion had to be custom made.

Max was about 200 feat from the group as she had ordered them to stay at the edge of the radioactivity. even With the enhanced zoom provided by the hellfire armor she could only see the edge of large crater off in the distance.

 _The enclave? But why let off an explosion in the middle of nowhere?_

Max started to head back towards the group. She may have had radiation immunity. But she wasn't about to walk into over 50 rad/s.

"Theirs no way we can get you back to the brotherhood. The radiation just where I was standing was 50 rad/s and the crater looks to be at least 10 kilometres in diameter. See if you can get a radio through to the brotherhood." max explained.

Jess fiddled with her pip-boy but all she got was static.

"No the radiations creating too much interference." jess replied.

"Pre-war maps show there's a general atomics facility north west of here. It shows that it had it's own broadcasting facility. I say we head their. Maybe we can send out a signal from their." max continued.

So the band of about thirty all clad in one form of power armor or another headed south to a ghost town called Indian springs , where the general atomics manufacturing facility was located. The trek was hard as the heat in the desert rose. The mid-day Nevada sun could overcome even the climate control units built into the vault-tec power armor.

They passed the small town of mercury when nightfall came and the hotel owner couldn't believe his luck when 30 heavily armed individuals and payed him with a dis-assembled auto-doc. The thing had to be worth more than a thousand caps if it worked. It was an obscure scene; thirty suits of power armor standing in the lobby of an empty hotel as one maxis star assembled an auto-doc. Once the auto-doc was assembled and board was payed max began to chat to the hotel owner.

"So where are you and your bunch of er...friends headed?" inquired the elderly hotel owner as he ran is bony fingers through his grey withered hair .

"We're headed down to Indian springs."

"Indian Springs? That place is a ghost town.

If you don't count all the psychopathic robots from general atomics."

"I wouldn't worry, we've got a plan for them."

"If I didn't know any better I'd thing you were going to take control of that place or something.

Your more than well enough equipped for it.

Don't see many bands of people with power armor, other than them brotherhood of steel folk who used to control the solar power plant way south of here in Vegas."

"Wait did you say Vegas?"

"Why yes I did youngen. You know the story right?

Magical city of lights that withstood the war.

Ruled over by robots controlled by the mysterious beneficiary of the city Mr House.

At least it was until somebody called the courier took over and kicked the NCR and Caesar's legion out of the place."

"The NCR I remember hearing about them back in the vault. Can't get the NCRPR station now where out of the vault. But the long range sensors used to pick up on it."

"Ah so you're a vault dweller then. May I inquire how you came to get so well armed then?"

"Most of the armor came from the vault security armory or dead enclave"

"With all that heavy weaponry, you an them enclave must have had quite the dust up. Anyway you've got quite a trek ahead of ya so you better get some rest youngen."

Max decided to take the elderly hotel owners advice and headed upstairs. Once on her room max stripped of the remainder of the hellfire armor. Max climbed into the double bed happy to be sharing it with scribe Jessica again.

In the morning after both max and Jessica had slid into their power armor and prepared the group to set off once again max decided that she hade some more questions for the man who ran the hotel.

"you mentioned something called Caesar's legion earlier. what is it?"

"the correct term would be was it accounting for the couriers securitron army destroying it.

but to answer your question Caesar's legion was a huge slave army controlled by a man named Caesar. they lived across the other side of the Colorado river until the couriers securitron army decimated their settlement at fortification hill during the second battle of hover dam. those who survived the battle formed smaller raider tribes.

A lot of them headed north taken slaves from some of the local towns. But I doubt their something people like your bunch couldn't handle."

Max thanked the man for his valuable information about the legion and then the group headed south toward Indian spring.


	6. Chapter 6 - Indian Springs

AN: thanks for the review, it is much appreciated. I will try to make a better attempt to identify who is speaking.

AN: I thought I'd explain vault 25. vault 25 was a vault constructed for enclave project epsilon. its main aim was that if project zeta (mothership zeta) should fail, they would use the vault dwellers for genetic experiments so they could safely recolonize the wasteland without fear of mutation, and the development of powerful energy weapons to exterminate the mutated people of the wastelands.

The journey from mercury to Indian springs was pretty easy going compared to the journey from enclave facility epsilon to vault 25 thanks to the less rugged terrain so it only took two days to reach Indian Springs. They arrived at the edge of the town where a rather sarcastic mister gutsy ordered them to stop. This is where max's plan came into action.

The mechanical drill Sargent voice that belonged to a mister gutsy stated "please state your business at general atomics. Trespasses will be set incinerated".

The robot hovered over through the group until it stopped in front of a woman called Jane Jackson.

Jane sported some of the insectoid enclave power armor. But more importantly she took her grandfather's general atomics security card wherever she went. A memento of times gone by.

"valid security card detected. Welcome back Mr Jackson. Our records indicate that you are late by 200 years. I hope you have a good explanation for your absence" the robot explained simulating laughter.

"Now what can I do for you Mr Jackson?".

Jane looked at max and then explained to the robot that max would now be in charge of all operations in the general atomics facility. The continued by instructing the robot the issue security cards to all of the 'new employees' that were with here.

The robot happy to have something to do after over 200 years of nothing hovered away to completed its task.

"So that's what you meant by a plan for them.

Now you have an army of killer robots what are you going to do?" jess inquired.

"I think the first step will be restoring the general atomics manufacturing facility to working order.

Get the broadcasting system up and running so you can let the brotherhood know what's going on."

Once issued with their new security cards max ordered the mister gutsy robots to form a perimeter around the general atomics facility as max and jess with the help of some of the mister handy robots began restoring the broadcasting system. The system was remarkably intact other than a couple of easily replaced parts and the work only took a couple of hours.

"brotherhood of steel facility epsilon, do you read me?" scribe Jessica spoke into the facilities microphone at a frequency only used by the brotherhood but the speaker just produced static.

The scribe repeated herself "brotherhood of steel facility epsilon, do you read me? This is head scribe Jessica."

The equipment continued to produce static for a couple of seconds until a familiar voice was produced by the systems speakers.

"Loud and clear Jess, your on the air with senior scribe Jacobson, what have you got on your mind?" Jacobson replied impersonating a radio show host.

"We attempted to return to epsilon however it seems we have been cut of by what looks to be a nuclear explosion. Areas way to radioactive to travel through. So we have travelled south to an abandon general atomics facility in Indian springs with a band of vault dwellers from max's vault." jess replied.

"Well that proves quite the problem Jess. I'll see if I can get the elder down here. He'll want to here about this."

Meanwhile max had made her way down to the facilities manufacturing floor where an eager mister handy called mister manager hovered around the floor until seeing max.

"Well how can I help miss Star?" it replied in the usual buzzy metallic voice.

"what is the state of the facilities production lines?"

"Lines 3, 5 and 9 are in standby mode.

Lines 1, 2, 5 and 8 are currently in shutdown mode awaiting the new mister gutsy design data and

Lines 4, 6, 7, and 10 are in shutdown mode awaiting repair.

Is their anything else I can do for you mistress?" explained mister manager.

"what do we currently have in our inventory?" max inquired.

"we currently have 70 mister gutsy units in storage ready to be shipped to the US military along with

90 standard mister handy units. We also have a stockpile of 89 tons of atomic fuel ready to power any more units we produce. Is their anything miss Star?" mister manager queried

"two things that I need you to do.

First I want you to bring all of the facilities security units to patrol the facility and eliminate any hostile threats. But make sure they don't harm anyone who surrenders. Just shoo them away or bring them to me.

Secondly I would like you to activate some of the standard models you mentioned earlier to clean up the facility and maintain the damaged production line."

"Yes miss. You know what they say. A clean workplace is a productive workplace" mister manager explained eager to complete his new masters task. By this time night had fallen over the town of Indian springs and max made her way to a makeshift bedroom setup in an old office. Happy with her plan and her new home max crawled into her bed noticing the smile on the scribes face.

 _I guess all went well with her chat with the brotherhood._

Max like her scribe fell asleep with a smile on her face.


	7. Chapter 7 - Legion remnants

Mister manager hovered above the makeshift bed that max shred with the scribe awaiting her master to awake. The sun poured into the room as the infernal oven known as the Mojave reheated itself for another day. The light that flooded the room quickly woke max who was used to the darkness and artificial light of vault 25.

"Mistress Star some people have made camp at the north end of the town. As per your instruction all security forces have remained within the perimeter of the facility. What would you like me to do?" explained the robot in a cheerful voice awaiting a response from it's master.

With a groan max still half asleep replied "Get some of the security robots who aren't doin anything and station them at the front desk". After half an hour the curiosity of who had entered her town overcame the comfort of her bed and she finally got up. It didn't take her long to suit up and arise the scribe. From their they made their way to the facilities cafeteria and assembled a meal using the contents of the various vending machines and what food remained edible in the cafeterias store room. Max and the scribe, accompanied by the few others who had risen early made their way to the front desk. As per max's instruction the others had put on their respective power armor and the band of seven, accompanied by four mister gutsy robots made their way to the north side of the town.

This journey only took ten minuets do to the relatively small size of the town. Once they arrived they were met by a man wearing a bear head on his head. Along with that he sported a silver and red helmet under it along with some scrappy armor that looked like it belonged to a roman soldier. The man announced himself saying

"who the hell are you and what business do you have with the legion remnants?"

"Names Maxis Star. And the 'business' I have is knowledge of what you might be doing at this little town?" max replied with a stare so cold even a death claw would have second thoughts about.

"We are the legion remnants and we come to claim this land for the glory of the empire so we may crush the courier and his 'independent new Vegas'" the legionary remnant continued arrogantly.

 _Their it is again. The courier. Who is this mysterious courier I keep hearing abut?_

After that brief thought max replied

"I'm not really fussed what you do. So long as you abide by my rules while in Indian springs" max explained attempting to projecting her presence onto the man.

"A legionary follow the orders of a woman. Hah that makes me laugh" the legionary responded once again with a cocky attitude that would make even Ghandi want to shoot him in the head. The legionary then gave a hand signal and legionaries burst out of the neighbouring buildings.

Some of them were armed with guns, most of them were armed with the signature weapons of the legion, the gladius. The legionnaire in front of her lunged with his gladius. The improperly named sword bounced of the duraframe armor lower arm, leaving the blade with a small concave dent. In one swift motion Max grabbed the handle of the blade, twisting the legions arm and forcing him to drop the sword. She then leaned forward, delivering a brutal head-butt that knocked out the legionnaire. A mix of strange electrical buzzes and zaps gunfire roared from behind Max her fellow vault dwellers reduced the legionnaires to piles of ash and goo.

"Everybody fan out. That includes you robots as well. If it looks like a roman, I want it dead" max exclaimed.

The robots happily complied incinerating all the legionaries they found. Max and her few followers entered the closest building to them, which appeared to be a small schoolhouse turning the legion inhabitants into nice little green piles of goo. It was there that jess discovered a group of ten what appeared to be slaves when one of them warned them.

"careful the legionaries fitted us with explosive collars".

To which Jess replied

"don't worry I know my way around the odd explosive. I'll have those collars of you in no time."

Jess quickly disarmed the collars, taking no more than five minuets.

"See. Told you, theirs nothing to these collars just a couple of wires and a pressure switch once its disabled it's all smooth sailing." jess explained throwing the collar aside.

Two of the mister gutsy robots entered the schoolhouse escorting what appeared to be a woman and two children all three were clearly slaves also. The front one reported

"Two of the romans were disintegrated mistress Star. What do you want me to do with these three things?"

"leave them to me" max replied then beginning to speak to the woman.

"don't worry about them. Their just robots to keep the place secure.

Now I imagine those explosive collars can't be comfortable. Stand still so I can disarm them".

Max quickly disarmed the collars discarding them where jess had thrown the others. Once complete the woman thanked her saying

"Thank you miss. I thought we would be killed before we were free. Its been so long since we were free.

I don't know what we are going to do. I'm just glad we are free of the legion".

"You could stay here. Help with the restoration effort over at out general atomics manufacturing facility. Or you could just stay here and enjoy the added security of. . . We don't really have a name?" max said a little confused as she said that last part.

"I don't think we'd be much help restoring the manufacturing facility so I guess we'll stay here. I'm just glad you guys came, like some mysterious order of liberators dealing justice to those legionaries" the woman said tearing up in the joy of her new found freedom.

"You know that's actually a pretty good name 'Liberators'. If not a little over the top. Yeah I like the sound of that Liberators. Thanks er. . . I didn't catch your name" max pondered.

"Mary" replied the woman. With that the group of seven humans and four robots returned to the general atomics facility followed by those they had rescued. The ex-slaves now decided to take up residence in some of the abandon houses around the facility.


End file.
